Customer Reviews
It will take more than just reading it but it DOES WORK! 
2008-09-23
Some people say just reading it and they aren't "cured" It won't happen right away.. But it will happen you need to believe in it and give it a chance. I used this book years ago and it worked for me. Now I had another stressful event of being abandoned and lied to and yup here is the pain again. I had to reread the book and talk to my mind.. try and let out all the emotions I was holding back. It's getting better. You can tell. The pain moves around. 1st it was in my shoulder blade, then my neck , now in the middle upper back!! Clearly its stress. I know alot of people this worked for too. You just need to be open minded!!!!!
No more confusion. Follow Dr. Sarno's advise. You will heal. 2008-07-16
As a personal fitness trainer I have seen how diet and exercise works
in preventing the reacurrence of back pain. Recently however, I saw a close family member in the midst of excrutiating back pain. We both felt helpless, and confused. Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection
Dr. Sarno's book really helped!
Richard Walters, MA. in Ed.
ACE Certified Personal Trainer
Author The 16 Minute Body Sculpting Kit: Attain Your Dream Body in Just 16 Minutes a Day!
I can't believe it works 2008-07-13
I stumbled on Dr. Sarno's book while I was searching for cure to my pain. I have had neck, leg and back pain for 6 months and it gets worse everyday. I tried everything I can find, nothing worked. Even pain killer didn't work. MRI shows L5 disc pressed the nerve, disc degeration... I was convinced that I will be bed ridden when I am in my 60s.
After I read the review here, I bought the book and read it as soon as I got it. The pain went away in a day!!! I shared this with my mother in law who is considering back surgery. She was in doubt. That alone will make her recovery long and slow. I strongly recommend this book.
help is on the way 2008-07-06
This particular Dr. Sarno book has been extremely helpful to several of my acquaintances and myself in over-coming physical pain such as backaches, sciatica,headaches, arthritis, and more. If you follow Sarno's thoughts, and are able to be objective and self-analyze, you may find that many pain issues can be helped and conquered with TMS. It's worth the read.
another voice in the healed masses 2008-07-01
This review will be quite short because so many folks have echoed my own experiences with Dr. Sarno's work... I just want to add my voice and enthusiasm about this book. I could not possible praise it's simplicity and effectiveness enough. If you are reading this, just buy the book - it's so very cheap and please, please believe me, it is worth your time.
Five Stars is not enough! 2008-06-07
The renowned author of the classic Mind Over Back Pain has written a new guide examining revolutionary treatments to relieve pain without exercise, medication, or physical therapy.
Suspect Theory -- No Practice Described 
2008-05-31
READING IT DID NOTHING FOR MY BACK PAIN
I'm perplexed that so many say, "all I did was read this book and I was healed from years of back pain." I read it, and it didn't change a thing. And there is no description of the actual method, except for what boils down to: "If you're in pain, ask yourself what you're angry about and you will be healed."
SIMPLISTIC MIND-BODY CONNECTION THEORIZING
Sarno's approach is simplistic, although he does offer biophysical knowledge about how stress affects the body. He derives his theory from Freud's notion of conversion reaction--that the unconscious transfers unpleasant feelings into physical symptoms. The logical corollary: if you become aware of your inner feelings, the body will release the pain.
MIND OVER MATTER? DO NO HARM?
The relationship of mind, body, emotions, and spiritual states is a complex dance. Sarno's "mind over matter" approach does a disservice to conventional and alternative healing modalities that have proven effective for back pain. He suggests that you continue your active lifestyle, discontinue all other treatments (e.g., chiropractic, physical therapy, acupuncture, stretching, surgery), and essentially, act as though the pain isn't there. In his view, those treatments alleviate, they don't heal.
This concerns me because 1] with extreme back pain, you can't continue your usual activities, and 2] if you try to do so, you could cause worsen the injury.
Finally, this book is repetitive. He could have made his point with 1/2 the number of words.
CAVEAT
I gave it 2 stars because understanding your emotions and biopsychological process supports healing. I suspect a strong placebo effect coupled with emotional release worded for a lucky few with pain that was mostly stress-related.
Yes, be in touch with how your feelings connect with your physical states, but take care. Treat your body with respect. It is a tough little plant that may occasionally get bruised and need very gentle, deep healing; it's not an untamed wild thing over which you must gain dominion.
I was a sceptic, but definitely changed my mind 2008-05-31
I bought this book, along with "Healing Back Pain Naturally" by Art Brownstein, M.D., after suffering from pain in the back, groin, abdomen and knee for some months. I skimmed over Dr. Sarno's book, but was sure that it didn't apply to me. MY pain was REAL, not something psychologically induced! So I launched into Dr. Brownstein's book, and, being sports-oriented, did many of his exercises for the back. I also had all the MRI's and x-rays done, all of which showed no physical problems at all.
After 8 months of sporadic improvement and setbacks, with their accompanying depression, I once again peeked into "Healing Back Pain," and suddenly, it all made perfect sense to me. I was able to perfectly correlate events that had been particularly upsetting to me with bouts of pain. Incredibly, just reading this and accepting it immediately made me feel much better.
I now scold any pains that pop up from now and then, reminding them that they're just a trick and not really physically based. They then slink off into the netherlands, where they belong. I intend to re-read Dr. Sarno's book from time to time, to try to avoid repressing anger and anxiety as I tend to do, and to review the daily reminders that he recommends.
My advice to you is to be open-minded and read this book, if you have had pain for some time. It really does make sense and it really does help.
Excellent book!!! 2008-05-14
This book changed my life forever as well as the way I look at pain in all forms. I suffered from many different TMS imperatives throuout my life and Dr. Sarno has lead me out of those dark places. I wrote a book about my journey through TMS and I hope it helps many people as well.
Kevin Jarvis
kevinrobertjarvis.com
The best fifteen bucks you'll ever spend--maybe 2008-05-11
I had serious back pain for about seven years. I kept it in control by going to a chiropractor (who tried to convert me to Scientology), exercises, acupuncture, painkillers, and the rest. The pain was in the lower back, and was made worse by sciatica. There were many times when my symptoms were so severe that it was too painful to even drive a car.
I read the book. I found it refreshing to have a clinician lay out some simple logic: how your back is in constant use and is therefore strong, how it heals as well and as quickly as any other part of your body after it is injured, and how his observations from X-rays suggested to him that there had to be a non-physical reason for all the thousands of complaints of pain that he was dealing with.
I thought about what I had read, and thought about it some more. The pain started going away. In short order I dropped the chiropractor (forty bucks per visit), the painkillers, and everything else I was doing, and just got on with my life.
There will be people out there who will not be helped by this book. But if you have back pain and have not been diagnosed with a serious condition, hell, even if you have--give it a read.
All I can say is that this book sure helped me. I don't have pain anymore (almost never at least.) I don't think about my back anymore, and I don't think there's anything wrong with me anymore.
You may have the same experience I had: no more back pain. How does that sound for fifteen bucks?
P.S. Since then I have read up on chiropractic treatment, and realize that the whole profession is pretty suspect. Did you know that the founder of chiropractic was a certain D.D. Palmer, who until then had been waving his hands over people to transfer healing power to their organs? His first claim of success was to heal a deaf person by adjusting his spine. Only thing is, of course, that the aural nerves aren't anywhere near the spine....
If I was a chiropractor I would try to keep my patients as far away from this book as possible. I think their waiting rooms would be a lot less crowded if more people read this book.
